Gate Lodge

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A symmetrical three-bay one-and-a-half-storey blackstone gate lodge in Gothic-Revival style; built c.1870 and located west of the main entrance to Moyallon House (HB17/01/023A), to the north side of Stramore Road north of Gilford. Rectangular plan with full-height extension (later) to west abutted by a modern two-storey flat-roof annexe; modern two-storey return to rear.

Pitched roof with geometrically laid natural slates and blue/black angled ridge tiles; central yellow-brick chimneystacks having tall clay pots; front and rear rooflights; plain bargeboards to gables. Cast-iron ogee rainwater goods on overhanging eaves. Walling is rock-faced blackstone laid in rough courses on a yellow-brick chamfered plinth. Yellow and brown brick quoins. Windows are bi-partite timber-casements in painted or yellow-brick surrounds with projecting painted sills; four-centered arched-headed windows to attic.

The principal elevation faces south; steeply pitched central gable with window, over a two-panelled timber door in painted brick surround, having brass door furniture and surmounted by four-centered arched-headed transom light; accessed via two granite steps. Door is flanked by a window to either side.

The west gable is abutted by a full-height extension in blackstone; two windows to first floor front. Ground floor is abutted by a flat-roof porch opening to east (boarded). West gable of extension is abutted by a modern annexe (of no interest). North elevation has a timber casement window and yellow-brick diamond motif over.

The north (rear) elevation has modern two-storey return (of no interest) to centre; window to left and right with yellow-brick surround and diamond motif over.

The east gable has window to centre at attic and pointed-headed blind entrance of yellow brick with yellow and brown brick surround to ground floor centre.

Setting:

Situated to the west of the main entrance of Moyallon House, to the north side of Stramore Road. Gravelled yard to east and rear accessed from south by rock-faced black stone square gate piers with pointed caps and iron gates; two-storey rubble stone barn to west. Lawned garden to front accessed from east by yellow-brick round-headed arch.

Roof: Natural slate
Walling: Blackstone laid in rough courses
Windows: Timber casements
RWG: Cast-iron

Historical information

The present gate lodge at Moyallon House, dating from 1871, is one of two lodges that were built between 1863 and 1871, as part of improvements carried out to the house and demesne by John Grubb Richardson. Dean states the architect to be ‘probably Thomas Jackson and Son’. (Dean)

Moyallon House is a linen mansion built in 1794 and still occupied today by descendants of the Quaker linen dynasty that first built on this site in the late eighteenth century. The house was radically remodelled in 1863 by John Grubb Richardson, but may incorporate earlier fabric. (Valuation records; Rankin)

Moyallon townland was settled in 1675 by the Christy family from Scotland, who are thought to have introduced the linen trade into the area. A group of closely related Quakers settled along the Bann between Moyallon and Lawrencetown in subsequent years, building mansion houses that reflected the increasing success of the linen manufacture and trade in which they were engaged. (Rankin)

A house is known to have existed on the site in 1781 when the nearby Friends Meeting House was built. The meeting house trust deed of 1781 included the gift by Thomas Christy of a right of way ‘in the right line from his gates to the said meeting house’, which continues to provide access to this day. (Butler)

A house on the present site was built in 1794 by Thomas Christy Wakefield, (1772-1861) descendant of the original Christy family and of Joseph Wakefield, owner of Moyallon bleach green. Thomas Christy Wakefield had been living in another house nearby, also called Moyallon House, which had been destroyed by fire. The present dwelling is captioned ‘Moyallan’ [sic] on the first edition OS map of 1834 which shows the main house and a service courtyard to the south that has survived. The present house is listed in the Townland Valuation (1826-40) as the property of Mr Thomas Wakefield and comprises a mansion house with cellars valued at £40.7s and having dimensions 49x38x27 and a number of single and two-storey outbuildings including a turf house, potato house, stables and lofts, a coach house, cow house and privy.

On the second edition (1858) the house is designated ‘Moyallan Ho[use]’ and a ‘Thrashing Machine’ is also captioned within its curtilage. Griffith’s Valuation states that the ownership of the house has now passed to John Grubb Richardson who owns the house in fee. In August 1863 the valuation of the buildings was raised from £55 to £100 because the dwelling house was being ‘rebuilt, enlarged and new wings added to it, also neat offices and gate lodges in progress.’ The third edition OS map of 1901-2 shows the new house with gate lodges and additional outbuildings. The architect of the remodelling is unknown but the Quaker Thomas Jackson was well-known to the Richardsons having designed meeting houses in Belfast and Lisburn and is thought by Dean to be responsible for the gatehouses at Moyallon. (Dean)

John Grubb Richardson was a descendant of the Richardsons of Lisnagarvey, some of the earliest plantation settlers in the area, recorded there in 1610. Many generations of the family were involved in the making and marketing of linen, initially in Glenmore, Lambeg and eventually in Liverpool, Philadelphia, New York, and the model village of Bessbrook. John Grubb Richardson was one of seven sons of James Nicholson Richardson, the founder of the company J.N. Richardson, Sons & Owden Ltd, a successful bleaching and warehousing firm. John Grubb Richardson purchased from Lord Charlemont the Mount Caulfield estate in Armagh, where his cousins the Nicholsons had already established a spinning mill. Richardson built a model village at Bessbrook from 1845, initially around spinning mills and eventually weaving factories with houses, a school, churches and a shop but no access to alcohol in accordance with the temperance practised by Quakers. In 1853 Richardson married Jane Marion Wakefield of Moyallon House and the property eventually passed to the couple on the death of her father. (Rankin)

In 1863 Richardson inherited an estate in County Tyrone and it is the sale of this estate which appears to have allowed him both to become the sole owner of Bessbrook works and village and to extend his new dwelling at Moyallon. A further gate house and a gas works (deleted 1910) were added to the estate in 1871 increasing the valuation once more to £140. John Grubb Richardson died in 1890 leaving his widow in residence at Moyallon House until her death in 1909. According to her will, Jane Richardson had two stepchildren and seven children of her own, one of whom, Thomas Wakefield Richardson took over the house on his mother’s death. T W Richardson is listed in the 1901 census, his mother being away from home at the time. He is present in the house with his English wife, a cook and a Quaker housemaid. When the gasworks was demolished in 1910, the valuation was decreased to £125. In 1911 Richardson and his wife were away from home but their staff had expanded to include a cook, lady’s maid, housemaid, kitchen maid and parlourmaid. The house passed to his widow, Hilda, after TW Wakefield’s death and, as the couple had no children, in 1945 the house became the property of their nephew Alexander Reginald Wakefield Richardson. (Rankin; valuation records)

In the First General Revaluation of 1933/4 the house was revalued at £118. The accommodation in the house at this time is listed. On the ground floor were a dining room, drawing room, library, morning room, flower room, cloakroom, billiards room, bedroom, butler’s pantry, servants’ hall, scullery, two kitchens, servants bedroom, two cloakrooms, bootrooms, three pantries and a larder. On the first floor were seven bedrooms, a sitting room, a bathroom with hot and cold water and a WC. On the second floor were six servants’ bedrooms, a bathroom and a boxroom. The outbuildings comprised a glass-walled museum (now gone), a laundry, drying-room and loft with three servants’ bedrooms, three steam-heated greenhouses, stabling, four motor houses (one with two rooms over), stores and agricultural buildings. The valuer comments that the house has its own electric light and the grounds include two grass tennis courts and a croquet lawn.

Alexander Richardson and his wife Marianne had four children at Moyallon but in the 1940s two of their children died of typhoid and a further child died a few years later. Because of the associations of the house with this terrible event, Alexander, Marianne and their son Hugh moved into a nearby Richardson property ‘The Grange’. The furniture in the then vacant Moyallon House was auctioned off and the premises was leased to the Department of Health and Social Services as a residential special care school and is so captioned on the OS map dating from the 1960s/70s. A fine marble fireplace was removed at this period and fitted in Derrymore House, Bessbrook, a property which had been donated by the Richardsons to the National Trust. In the 1970s the house was occupied by a Mrs Mathers who ran it as a guest house, following which it was vacant for some years. In the early 1980s the house was renovated as a family home. (Chapman). There has been a remarkable continuity of ownership from the Christy’s who first built the house in 1794. (Rankin)

The south wing of the house is now called ‘The Lodge’ and in the 1990s was developed into three self-contained flats by architect William C Callaghan of Portadown. As part of this development, a verandah of wood and glass that is shown on the first survey photograph was taken down and a single-storey flat-roofed extension built in its stead. (HB file)

The present gate lodge has been extended in recent years by the addition of a double-height extension to the north facade to designs by William C Callaghan of Portadown. (HB file)

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/3/26/1 First Edition OS Map 1834
2. PRONI OS/6/3/26/2 Second Edition OS map 1858
3. PRONI OS/6/3/26/3 Third Edition OS Map 1901-2
4. PRONI OS/6/3/26/4 Fourth Edition OS Map 1920-21
5. PRONI VAL/1/B/350 Townland Valuation (1828-40)
6. PRONI VAL/2/B/3/48A Griffiths Valuation (1861)
7. PRONI VAL/12/B/16/25A-G Annual Revisions (1864-1929)
8. 1901 census online
9. 1911 census online
10. NIEA HB file

Secondary Sources

1. Butler, D.M. “The Quaker Meeting Houses of Ireland” Dublin: Irish Friends Historical Committee, 2004
2. Chapman, Ross (Friends’ Historical Committee)
3. Dean, J. A. K. “The Gate Lodges of Ulster: A Gazetteer.” Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1994.
4. Rankin, K “The Linen Houses of the Bann Valley, The story of their families” Belfast, Ulster Historical Foundation, 2007

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
H-. Alterations detracting from building
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

A symmetrical three-bay one-and-a-half-storey Victorian blackstone gate lodge in Gothic-Revival style; built c.1870 and located west of the main entrance to Moyallon House (HB17/01/023A). Modified in recent years to incorporate a return to rear and flat-roof extension to west, altering the original proportions and degrading the original character of the building. Despite this, much of the architectural detailing is intact and the building retains its group value in the context of the site (HB17/01/023A-D). The original lodge is a good example of the type and its historic character remains evident.